How Deep

How deep the Father’s love for us

How vast beyond all measures

That He should give His only son

To make a wretch His treasure

 

I’ve yet to experience anything so sweet as the love of Jesus Christ. In this season of life, I’ve found myself shaken underneath His love more so than ever before. As my first semester of college begins to come to a close and I look back over just the few months that I have spent here, I am in awe of my God. I once read a quote that said something to the effect of “sometimes we must be stripped of all, to see that He is all we need.”

I vividly remember my first week here in Troy. It was the first day of sorority recruitment with all types of nerves and emotions flowing through me. What I had anticipated for so long was finally a reality and I just knew it was going to be too good to be true. Before the week came to a close I sat countless times on my dorm room floor in tears of confusion, loneliness, and fear. I figured that since it was only week 1 the best was yet to come and all that I was experiencing that was not part of the plan would soon fade away. I would find myself making friends, having plans every night, and never have time to even consider being homesick very soon. A couple weeks passed by and although I had made a couple of friends and was surrounded by people, I had never felt so alone. I could not quite wrap my mind around what was happening. I had watched those that had come to college before me fall into normalcy in what seemed like in a couple of days, and was even seeing some of those around me in that time seem to jump right into the swing of college with friends that were as if they had known each other since toddler years. To put it straight forward: my first semester of college has been nothing that I expected it to be. I have cried many nights, my heart has been broken, I’ve counted down the hours until I could steal away and go home, and questioned if Troy was where I was supposed to be. I didn’t get into the club that I had hoped to, I’m still looking for the church that I will go to during my time here, I don’t have a huge group of friends that I hang out with every night till midnight, and sometimes I still eat lunch alone.

I was stripped of all that I had imagined college to be. I was away from my friends, my family, and my comfort. There was nobody to turn to, I only had one option: Jesus. I came to college with my faith, and had every intention to continue to grow in it here. However, I thought that would be from getting plugged into an awesome church, making friends with people sold out for the sake of the cross, and being involved with ministries on campus. Instead, it was a lot messier. It was tears, heartbreak, and doubt that led me to a place underneath His love that I had yet to experience. I had never dealt with the things that I was facing and been on the level that I was on. It was in that place that the love of Christ came in and filled every hole in my heart, caught every tear dripping down my cheek, and wrapped his arms around my shaking and cold shoulders. I was confused as to why I had been driven to my knees in this way, and I found that it was because if I had ridden onto the mountain tops as I had wanted to I would be attempting to feel a void in my life that was only meant for one thing: the fully satisfying love of Jesus Christ.

Although it was a place so unexpected, how thankful I am that is where I ended up. It’s hard to explain something so great to someone else without them having the same personal experience. This is where I find myself in explaining the deep love of the Father that I have experienced in this first semester. While visiting a friend’s church in Auburn last weekend, the pastor spoke on the greatness of Christ. He gave the illustration of thin ice shaking under the weight of someone stepping onto it. This happens because the person is greater than the ice and it can’t help but shatter beneath. The same is true in any other aspect of life, as is with Jesus in our lives. He is so much greater than we are. When He steps into our lives our worlds shake because we cannot help but move beneath His vast greatness. In my opinion, this perfectly describes my first semester of college. God continues to step into my life and I shake underneath His greatness compared to my own. It is not a scary shaking, but a shaking of my heart that wakes me up, brings life to dry does, and establishes joy in the deepest parts parts of my heart. He has and is continuing to fulfill me with His love like no other thing can.

As this semester is drawing to a close I am so overwhelmed by how faithful God has been to me. I came in with expectations of how college would be right away, and none of those came true. Jesus has blessed me instead with such good things that I could have never drawn up myself.

Palm 84:11 For the LORD God is our sun and our shield. He gives us grace and glory. The LORD will withhold no good thing from those who do what is right.

This verse has carried me through many days throughout this semester. Sometimes I get caught up on what I want and frustrated when I don’t get those things, whatever they may be, but what a truth to know that the Lord God will withhold no good thing from me. As I have been learning, many times the things that I am hoping for are being withheld because He has something so much better. God is good, His love is great, and there is no place I would rather be than lost inside His arms.

 

Dear Jesus,

Thank you so much for this season of my life. Thank you more for your deep love that is far greater than any other love that could be offered to me. Thank you for growing me in this season and covering me in grace and faithfulness. All else falls so short in comparison to You. God thank you for revealing yourself to me in such awesome ways. I want nothing else as much as I just want to know you more! You are so good and I cannot help but love you so much.

 

Love, Em